The effectiveness of an online advertising campaign can be measured using various techniques. One technique includes measuring the conversion rate of the advertising campaign as a way of estimating whether the advertisements are effective at driving consumer behavior. A campaign conversion can generally be defined as a consumer being presented with an advertisement and then taking a particular action. Examples of actions that can be considered a campaign conversion include engagement with or clicking on the advertisement, accessing and/or browsing a web site of the advertiser, downloading and/or purchasing a product sold or provided by the advertiser, signing up for a subscription from the advertiser, providing information to be added to an advertiser's mailing list, etc.
As part of an online advertising campaign, an advertiser can use various advertising channels for delivering advertisements to consumers. For example, an advertiser can contact content publishers (e.g., news web sites, blogs, social networking websites, etc.) directly to arrange for advertisements associated with an advertising campaign to be presented to consumers (e.g., a direct publisher channel). In other examples, an advertiser can use programmatic advertising channels to buy and/or place advertisements. For example, an advertiser can contact a marketer who can arrange for advertisements to be shown on various web pages and/or arrange for advertisements to be placed in advertisement placements on one or more web sites through one or more real-time bidding exchanges. As another example of programmatic buying, an advertiser can contact a demand side platform that can arrange for advertisements to be placed in advertisement placements on one or more web sites through one or more real-time bidding exchanges. As yet another example of programmatic buying, an advertiser can use a real-time bidding exchange directly to bid on the opportunity to place advertisements.
When advertisements are delivered to consumers using these advertising channels, one or more targeting parameters can be used to target specific types of consumers. For example, advertisements can be delivered to specific consumers who fall into various demographic groups or psychographic groups. In another example, advertisements can be delivered to consumers that have visited specific types of web sites, consumers that are located in certain geographic areas, etc.
Attribution of conversion actions can be performed (or measured) to determine which of the advertising channels to attribute a conversion action to. For example, when a conversion action is performed, it can be matched with one or more advertisements from one or more particular advertising channels that were presented to the consumer that performed the conversion action. A conversion rate for each particular advertising channel can be determined by comparing the number of conversions attributable to that advertising channel and the total number of advertisements presented through that advertising channel.
In conducting an advertising campaign, advertisers can use multiple channels for delivering advertisements, including multiple partners within the same type of channel (e.g., multiple marketers, multiple demand-side platforms, multiple direct publishing partners, etc.). When multiple channels are being used to deliver advertisements to consumers, conversion rates calculated for the various channels, along with the cost of advertising via those channels can be used to determine a return on investment of advertising. For example, one channel may be low cost but also have a low conversion rate, while another may be higher cost and also have a higher conversion rate. Using a measurement such as return on investment (“ROI”), an advertiser can attempt to determine the cost effectiveness of different channels despite the channels having different cost structures.
Although conversion rate can be used to determine the comparative effectiveness of advertising through various channels, determining the quantitative effect of a certain advertising channel (e.g., whether the conversion was the result of the advertisement being presented to a consumer) can be problematic. For example, various advertising channels can use consumer modeling and/or behavioral targeting techniques to present advertisements to consumers that are more likely than a typical consumer to perform conversion actions (e.g., buy the advertised product, visit the advertised web site, etc.). However, the consumers being targeted may have performed the conversion action regardless of whether they were presented with an advertisement. If the consumer is likely to have performed the conversion action without being presented with the advertisement, then presenting the user with the advertisement may not be a cost effective way for an advertiser to use its advertising budget. Moreover, when judging the effectiveness of different advertising channels based on conversion rates, it is difficult to determine what quantitative effect the advertising delivered via each advertising channel has on the conversions and/or whether the conversions were actually caused by the advertising delivered via the advertising channels at all.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide methods, systems, and media for managing online advertising campaigns based on causal conversion metrics.